Contemporary Monologue Competition: What It Is, Where It’s Run and How It’s Judged

A solo drama class in which one learner performs a single character’s speech taken from modern writing, judged on how truthfully the character is played, how clearly the words are spoken and how well the piece is kept inside a time limit that grows with school grade.

Contemporary Monologue is a solo class in which one performer presents a speech for one character, written in modern language rather than in the verse or period style of the classics. The performer stands alone, usually with no scenery and little or no costume, and speaks to an imagined listener, to the audience or to themselves. Because there is no scene partner to give cues, the whole performance rests on how clearly the performer understands who the character is, what has just happened to them and what they want from the moment.

In the one schedule we build from, a South African drama eisteddfod held in Pretoria, the class is an individual entry for boys and girls together, spoken in English. It runs on a four-step school-grade ladder with a time limit that rises at every step: Grade 3 has two minutes, Grades 4 and 5 have three minutes, Grades 6 and 7 have four minutes and Grades 8 to 12 have five minutes. Those grade bands are built here as ages 9, 10 to 11, 12 to 13 and 14 to 18, using the usual South African correspondence between grade and age, and no adult or open tier is published.

A round is simple to run. The performer is called, gives the title of the piece and the name of the character, settles for a moment and then performs for no longer than the limit for their grade. The adjudicator marks the performance and, in most eisteddfods of this kind, gives spoken or written advice to take away. A younger entrant with a short, clear speech and a definite idea of the character will usually beat an older one who recites a long piece in one voice from start to finish.

Organisers run the class because it is an accessible way into acting. A monologue needs no cast, no set and little rehearsal space, so a school can enter learners at every grade, and the rising time limit gives each learner a realistic step to aim for as they move up through the school. The same schedule offers neighbouring monologue classes for classical texts and for performances that use recorded sound or images, which makes this the plain, text-and-voice version of the three.

Where Contemporary Monologue is run

In eTalenter’s data the class appears in one template: the English-language monologue classes of a drama eisteddfod held in Pretoria, South Africa, where it is entered at four school-grade tiers. Monologue classes in general are common in the British-style eisteddfod and festival tradition, and the catalogue carries many of them under other titles, such as Monologue, Dramatic Monologue and Shakespearean Monologue, but this particular class and its grade ladder come from that single South African schedule, so it should not be read as a worldwide standard.

• South Africa (Pretoria, Gauteng – English-language drama eisteddfod)

Key facts

• Individual entry: one performer per entry, boys and girls together, in English.
• Four school-grade tiers: Grade 3, Grades 4-5, Grades 6-7 and Grades 8-12, built here as ages 9, 10-11, 12-13 and 14-18.
• Maximum time rises with the tier: two, three, four and five minutes, counted per performer.
• Marks are installed on a nominal ten-point scale because the syllabus does not print a points table; adjudicators in the source work in percentages and certificate symbols.
• The same schedule runs Classical Monologue (Grades 8-12 only) and Multimedia Monologue (the same four grade tiers) as separate classes.
• Idea starters, not rules: a funny or touching speech from a modern children’s play for the youngest tiers, a monologue written by a learner’s own teacher or older sibling for the middle tiers, and a speech from a modern South African or international stage play for the Grade 8-12 tier. Always check your own syllabus for what counts as contemporary.

On eTalenter, Contemporary Monologue is filed under Action and typically scored with Marks. It appears in 1 ready-made event templates — each one can adjust its time limit, age-group assignment and scoring setup independently.

Across the templates that use it, Contemporary Monologue is most often entered as an Individual competition, typically scored out of 10, commonly time-limited to 2–5 minutes where a limit is set.

What judges look at in Contemporary Monologue

What a Contemporary Monologue panel is actually weighing up, and where the marks are usually won or lost:

• Truth of the character: the audience believes the speaker is a real person in a real situation, with a want, a mood and a reason to speak now, shown in voice, face and stance rather than in pulled faces or stock gestures.
• Voice and clarity: every word reaches the back of the hall, endings of words are finished, volume and pace change with the thought, and nerves do not turn the speech into a rush.
• Understanding of the text: the performer plainly knows what each sentence means, where the thought turns and which words carry the point, so that the speech builds rather than repeating one note.
• Choice of piece: the speech suits the performer’s age and grade, gives them something to play and is cut so that it has a beginning, a development and an end inside the limit.
• Control of time and stage: the piece finishes within two, three, four or five minutes according to grade, the entrance and the first line are confident, and the performer holds the final stillness before leaving.
• Use of memory: lines are secure enough that the performer can look at the audience and listen to their own speech instead of searching for the next word.

Treat these as the judging focus, not a fixed rubric: publish your own weighted criteria for Contemporary Monologue under Scoring Setup, or start from the full mono act judging criteria guide.

How to prepare for Contemporary Monologue

How entrants and their teachers usually get Contemporary Monologue right on the day:

• Choose a speech that fits your grade and your voice; a short piece that you love and understand will beat a famous one you only half follow, and the first test is whether you can say in one sentence what the character wants.
• Read the whole play, story or book the speech comes from, so you know what happened before the speech starts and where the character goes afterwards, even though the audience will only see the middle.
• Cut the speech with a stopwatch to the limit for your grade (two minutes in Grade 3 up to five minutes in Grades 8-12) and aim to finish about ten seconds early, leaving room for a pause before the first line and after the last.
• Mark your copy with pencil: breaths, the key word in each sentence and the place where the character changes mood. Then speak from the marked copy until the marks are in your head and you can put the paper away.
• Rehearse in three stages: sitting down to learn the words, standing still to learn the voice, and moving only where the character would move, so that every gesture has a reason.
• Perform for someone who has not seen the piece and ask what the character wanted and how they felt at the end; if the answer does not match your plan, change the opening lines first.
• On the day, introduce the title and character clearly, wait until you are ready, keep your eyes on a fixed spot above the audience and stay in character until the final stillness is over, even if you slip a line.

Frequently asked questions

Is Contemporary Monologue judged individually or as a team?

Across eTalenter’s templates it’s most often run as an Individual entry, though an organiser can set either participation type when assigning the item to an age group.

What does “contemporary” mean in a monologue class?

In general it means a speech from modern writing, in everyday language, as opposed to a classical text such as an old verse play. The Pretoria schedule we build from lists it alongside a separate Classical Monologue class and a Multimedia Monologue class, so check your own syllabus for how it defines the term and whether the text may be your own writing.

How long can my monologue be?

In the South African schedule the maximum is two minutes in Grade 3, three minutes in Grades 4-5, four minutes in Grades 6-7 and five minutes in Grades 8-12. The time is counted per performer and is a maximum, so shorter is fine; check what your own festival does when a piece runs over.

How is it different from Classical Monologue and Multimedia Monologue?

All three are solo speeches in the same schedule. Classical Monologue is published only for Grades 8-12 and uses classical text. Multimedia Monologue shares the same four grade tiers as this class but is the version that brings recorded sound or images into the performance. Contemporary Monologue is the plain version, built on modern text and the performer’s voice and presence.

Is a contemporary monologue judged individually or as a team?

Individually. One performer is on the stage, the adjudicator marks that performer alone, and the entry is for boys and girls together at every tier.

Can I use props, costume or music?

The schedule we build from does not print rules for props or costume in this class, and music or recorded sound belongs to the separate Multimedia Monologue class. Check your own syllabus; in general, a monologue works best with a chair at most and a performer who creates the scene with voice and eyes.

Want the full judging picture? Read the full mono act judging criteria guide, or browse every action competition item.